Back in the ‘90s, Clip Art took over Word and PowerPoint files thanks to the thousands of office workers and students who used the images as a way to “improve” their documents. These days there are a large number of free images available on the web, and Microsoft is recognizing this by killing off its Clip Art portal in recent versions Word, PowerPoint, and Outlook. “The Office.com Clip Art and image library has closed shop,” explains Microsoft’s Doug Thomas. “Usage of Office’s image library has been declining year-to-year as customers rely more on search engines.”
As an artist I resent some people's assumption that original art from my abilities and imagination, which I have sacrificed a lot to develop, should somehow default to public property. If we require artists to participate in a money economy their art belongs to them. Copying images and not following the copyright owners permissions to the letter is stealing, outright. And deep pockets like Disney has taught individuals that the hard way.
There it was, inside the program you were already using. Sure, it wasn’t pretty, but you could quickly add a visual highlight to your document or presentation. Even better: everything was rights-cleared, meaning you could use it in your document or PowerPoint presentation without the fear of legal repercussions Confused About Copyright Law? These Online Resources Can Help Confused About Copyright Law? These Online Resources Can Help It's a confusing subject, yes, but it's important that you wrap your head around it. If you're involved in any sort of creative work, these resources will help you do just that. Read More .
Be careful: most Creative Commons images require attribution, meaning you need to give credit to the artist in order to use the image. Make sure you understand Creative Commons and other licenses 3 Popular Image Licenses You Need To Be Familiar With Before Using Someone's Photos 3 Popular Image Licenses You Need To Be Familiar With Before Using Someone's Photos Read More before using such images.
My colleague Chris compared Google Image search to Bing Bing Images vs. Google Images - Which Has Better Results? Bing Images vs. Google Images - Which Has Better Results? Bing’s image search once challenged Google, offering more features and a better design. With infinite scrolling and the ability to search for similar images, Bing was legitimately better than Google at image search just a... Read More , and found Google’s results to be better. If you feel the same way, don’t worry: you can use it to find rights-cleared images. While searching for an image, click Search Tools then Usage Rights.
I just got a new computer with Windows 10. Naturally, I had to download several "new" programs, Word, Excel, Power Point. I am so upset that they have removed the Clip Art feature from Word. I used this all the time when publishing our community news letter and calendar. I am looking for an easy to use replacement, but so far, no luck. Any suggestions? Thanks.

This pretty seriously ticks me off. Why in the world would a company delete something that far ranging without at least sending an email to the customer or broadcasting it on every platform possible? I used clip art on a regular basis....making cards, mailing labels, chore charts, papers for my homeschool, etc. It would have been nice to be able to save off all those clip art graphics to my own drive before MS Office did one of their lovely updates and removed everything. Personally, I detest Bing and I'm not even remotely interested in getting involved with anything involving copyright law. Maybe it's time to make the journey to Open Office at last. Buh bye Microsoft!

It’s not hard to find images to use online – just use an image search. This works well, but it’s worth noting that doing so isn’t necessarily legal. Most of the images you can find this way are owned by their original creators. This likely doesn’t matter if you’re only using something for private use, or even a school assignment, but if you intend to publish a work you need to make sure all rights are cleared.
Which brings us to Creative Commons, the license Office’s new Bing-powered search filters for. My colleague Danny explained what Creative Commons is, and why you should use it What Is Creative Commons, And Should You Use It? What Is Creative Commons, And Should You Use It? Creative Commons is a set of licenses which automatically give you permission to do various things, such as reuse and distribute the content. Let's find out more about it and how to use it. Read More , but the quick version is that it’s a way for artists to tell the web their images are free to use.